A disbarred Nevada lawyer living in Beverly Hills has been indicted on
federal fraud and money laundering charges for allegedly running an investment
scheme that collected more than $9.5 million for purported oil company
investments, prosecutors said yesterday.

Mark Roy Anderson, 56,
was named in 12-count indictment returned Wednesday by a federal grand jury,
the U.S. attorney for the
Central District of California said in a release. Anderson was arrested by federal
authorities on Feb. 23 after being charged in a criminal complaint that was
filed in federal court.

Prosecutors claim that Anderson solicited investments
from victims who were told that their money would be invested in various oil
companies and oil-related ventures in Oklahoma and California. Claiming that investments would be made in
companies with names that included National Healthcare Technology, Terax
Energy, Westar
Oil, China Oil and Petrolects.

Anderson allegedly promised
victims substantial returns on their investments. The indictment also alleges
that Anderson told victims that they
were buying unrestricted shares in certain companies, meaning that the victims
could sell the shares immediately.

The indictment alleges
that instead of using investors’ money for the oil ventures, Anderson and his then-wife spent
investors’ money for their own personal use. Prosecutors say the couple used
investors’ funds to purchase a Beverly Hills residence and an interest in the now-closed
Prego restaurant in Beverly
Hills.

The indictment says Anderson failed to tell victims
that he had previously been convicted of mail fraud, that he had been
disbarred, and that a federal judge in Texas had ordered Anderson and Westar Oil to stop
violating securities law and to pay nearly $3 million in penalties

The indictment alleges
that Anderson caused at least 10
investors to invest over $9.5 million, very little of which was returned to the
victims.

Anderson was freed on a
$250,000 bond after being arrested last week and is scheduled to be arraigned
Monday in U.S. District Court on three counts of wire fraud, three counts of
securities fraud and six counts of money laundering.

Three years ago, in an
article entitled “You Can’t Keep a Bad Man Down,” Forbes magazine reported hat
Anderson had at one time owned the Union Bank Building in Los Angeles, before
it went into receivership amidst claims that he failed to deliver on promises
to investors, and that he had served a prison term for a $50 million real
estate fraud of which he was convicted in 1991.